Arctic Monkeys say new album ‘The Car’ took “a lot longer to get to the end”
Arctic Monkeys have shared a few remarks about making their forthcoming seventh studio album, The Car, and revealed some of the inspiration behind one of the songs.
Alex Turner and Matt Helders appeared on Belgian radio station 3FM with Vera Siemons ahead of playing an intimate Studio Brussel show. Siemons asked the pair if they remembered when they felt like the record was finished.
Turner responded: “It took us a lot longer to get to the endpoint of this one than any of the others. I suppose because we had a bit more time. Maybe the longer you let it go on, the more you want to let yourself make adjustments. Perhaps all of that might have got a bit silly at the end in that respect… Remarkably, I don’t know if I’ve ever listened to this one in a car.”
Siemons then asked whether the track ‘Mr. Schwartz’ had been written in reference to Delmore Schwartz, the American poet. However, Turner said: “No, it’s just a coincidence. Another Schwartz, a Mrs Schwartz, came on my barometer the other day. There’s a George Saunders short story called Offloading for Mrs. Schwartz, and I don’t know, maybe subconsciously it had come from there.”
He added: “But I don’t think it’s either. I saw the name on the back of an Alfa Romeo, underneath the tail light in a… I’d love to know the name of the typeface, but I don’t. But I’d describe it as like ’90s, surfy, and it said Del Schwartz on the back of it. So we had a song called that for a while that didn’t make the record. And that led to Mr. Schwartz.”
The Car is set to come out on October 21st, and Arctic Monkeys have recently announced a world tour to take place throughout 2023, with Fontaines D.C. set to support them on the North American leg.
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